Stop the Shangri-La Orangutan Exploitation

Shangri-La's Rasa Ria Resort & Spa is a 5-star holiday resort an hour from Kota Kinabalu, the capital of the Sabah state in Malaysian Borneo.

For almost 20 years the Rasa Ria Resort (RR) have been continuously supplied with orphan orangutans from the Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Centre (SORC) in Sandakan.

According to the Shangri-La website, the purpose of RR's 'Orangutan Care' project is to rehabilitate orangutans (for wild release). The orangutans are later returned to the SORC to continue the rehabilitation process.

However, the Shangri-La Group uses the facade of rehabilitation to exploit the orangutans at the resort through tourism for profit.

Many individuals have expressed concern regarding the treatment and care orangutans at the resort receive. In late 2014 yet another orangutan, called ‘Tenten’, died at RR. In 2003 three baby orangutans were killed at RR. We have asked the Shangri-La Group to publicly announce the number of orangutans who have died at the resort but they have refused to do so while ignoring our request to voluntarily stop the exploitation at RR.

Earlier last year the former General Manager of RR admitted “this (the orangutans at RR) is one of the assets that we have here”.

RR's "rehabilitation" of orangutans also breaks the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) guidelines on rehabilitation and the Shangri-La Group is aware of this. In a real rehabilitation centre tourism isn't allowed to a) minimize habituation to humans b) reduce disease risk. Rehabilitation must ONLY take place in a rehab centre (and not a luxury hotel).

Please sign and share this petition to demand the Shangri-la Group to stop the exploitation of Sabah's orangutans and return all existing orangutans at RR back to the SORC. No orangutan should be sent to the resort again.